In recent years, the adverse effects of climate change and global warming have led to an increased interest in renewable energy as a clean and abundant energy source. A global effort is underway to transition away from fossil fuel based electrical energy generation to renewable generation. However, this transition has significant technical, political and geopolitical challenges that need to be overcome.
Renewable energy is abundantly available everywhere in the world. However, renewable energy is intermittent, non-dispatchable (which means that it cannot be turned on and off as required) and depending on geography and the type of renewable energy, is available for only limited amounts of time during a day.
The energy requirements of communities and of the world generally, however, are for a continuous supply of stable electricity, 24-hours a day.
Many existing electricity networks are currently designed to deliver a continuous supply of stable electricity, 24-hours a day. However, their design is usually based on predictable sources of energy and, dispatchable generation that is available 24-hours a day.
Because grid networks are designed for predictable, disptachable generation that is available 24-hours a day, it has limitations that include the need for large sums of capital to grow the network and long lead times to build infrastructure, the interdependence of which causes vast areas of the network to concurrently fail and causes major maintenance and upkeep requirements.
Due to these limitations, especially the need for large capital expenditures required, there are still about 1.3 billion people in the world who do not have any, or proper, access to electricity.
Therefore, in order to overcome the limitations of the existing grid infrastructure and uniqueness of renewable generation, distributed energy solutions have to be developed that enable electricity to be generated and consumed in the same location. These solutions must consist of renewable generation technologies, such as photovoltaics solar (“PV”), wind, energy storage (batteries), and a control system that enables the generation, regulation, control and delivery of continuous, stable electricity 24-hours a day.
The solution to this problem is believed to lie in providing different generation sources to be aggregated and the generated energy regulated and controlled. Then, the aggregated energy can be supplied to energy storage systems for availability during non-generation times. The load will thus be managed.
Currently, attempts are being made to build such solutions by combining multiple sources of renewable energy, including other generating systems such as the utility grid, various types of energy storage, into a single system with an AC and/or a DC output. This typically requires connecting each individual energy generation source to a central controller, designing complex software that monitors the load profile and dispatches energy from the appropriate source and managing the multiple communications protocols between the various energy sources, the controller and the load. Such integration typically requires complex software customized for each deployment. While such deployments are being rolled out, they are inadequate to meet the needs of a proper transition from fossil fuels to a renewable based energy network.